1970 September.pdf - What's On at Hutchins...

THE HEADMASTERtSREPORT1969FORMr Chairman of the Board,Professor Mitchell,Mr Minister,Ladies and Gentlemen.10IN the introductory remarks of my report lastyear I commented on the bad luc~.the schoolhad had in the past when pohtlCans werebooked as our guest speakers. That bad luckcontinues to dog us, but I am delighted tojoin our Chairman in welcom~ng Pr?fessorMitchell to his first Speech NIght wIth us.As the Professor of Surgery he is the memberof a very invigorating faculty, and fortunatelyfor all of us one of a faculty which is activelyco-operating with all branches o~ education.There is nowadays a much closer lmk betweenthe University and the Schools, and I amhopeful that we will be able to forge an evenstronger link.Today we have in the scho.ol nc:arly 550boys. There are 93 in the matnculatIOn class,356 in the Senior and Middle Schools, and191 in the Junior School.The staff continues to remain very stable,but this year we have to say farewell to aman who has been the guide and mentor ofso many for so long. Frank Will~ams leavesus tonight after 21 years teachmg at t~eschool, of which for 11 years he has been mcharge of the Middle School. He has s~enmany changes, and he has been responslb~efor many of them. The varied facets of IllScareer have been printed in the current schoolmagazine, but tonight I should like to thankhim on behalf of the whole school ~nd oftheir parents for his tireless devotIOn toindividuals for all the unseen and unheraldedwork done'for them, for the time and carefulpreparation he ha~ given, ~nd above all forthe self-less life gIVen to hIS boys.. On YOl~rbehalf I would like to wish both hIm and hISwife a wonderful European trip and a fruitfuland busy retirement on their return.Although at the school for a much shortertime Mr Orgill has proved himself a teacherTHE HEADMASTERthat we can ill afford to lose. His interestshave been manifold and he will be hard toreplace. It was indeed a sever.e blow. to knowthat on medical grounds hIS famIly werecompelled to return to the.mainland. H~ andhis family go to Sydney WIth our best WIshes,and we confidently hope that the ma,nyrevitalised activities in the school for whIchMr Orgill was responsible, will remind bothhim and us of a happy and well spent period.I am certain that the slopes of our MountNelson bivouac area will never sound thesame again!Mr Frost who joined us last year duri~gthe Chaplain's absence on study leave, willbe joining the State Department at Devonpo~tnext year. Mr Frost has amazed us all by h.lsversatility, and certainly the bushwalkers WIllmiss his quiet charm and depth of knowledge.'rVe also farewell Mrs Scott fron~ the InfantDepartment, who will be returnmg to E.n g ­land. She has been a happy and .ef~clentstaff member who has helped a lot m mtroducingthe creative activities into the lowerforms. Our best wishes go with both her andher husband.Next year will see some adjustments internallyin the staff. Mr ~eorg~ McKay has askedto be relieved of 111$ dutles as Headmasterof the Junior School so that he can coneentrateon being a Prep VI form master. Iagree? to. his request with some misgivingsas thIS WIll be the end of a notable periodduring which the Junior School has beenunder the control of "Sir." However, "Sir" isnot lost to us and I look forward to havinghis kindly wisdom available in the future. Inhi~ place I have appointed the School Chaplam,Mr Eagle. He will continue to act asthe School Chaplain and I look forward tohis return from England at the end of thismonth. I have appointed Mr John Millingtonto be Master of the Middle School in successionto Mr Williams. He went on a fact findingtour of other Middle Schools on the mainlandat the beginning of this term, and I am confidentthat he will be a very worthy successorto Mr Williams.Next year we shall be welcoming MrSanders, who was Deputy Headmaster atLenah Valley State School as a Grade VIteacher, Mr Humphreys at Grade V, MissCross at Grade III and Miss Pease at Grade 1.One of the outstanding academic achievementsthis year was won not by a boy, but byone of our staff, Mr Heyward. He has beengranted his doctorate for research on GermanLiterature and his reward after so many yearsof detailed work, is a great inspiration to allof us in our quest for scholarship and truth.The scholarship level at the school continuesto do well. I would urge you all to studyfacts carefully. The details of our successesare in your programme. I will highlight oneor two major points. Firstly of our matriculantslast year, 81% of our second yearcandidates matriculated, or 73.7% of all ourcandidates who took sufficient subjects tomatriculate. These figures compare mostfavourably with the state figures of 56%,especially when it is realised that the vastmajority of candidates come from the matriculationcolleges. All too often misleading factsare quoted and I would urge you all topublicise our results. Secondly, I would drawyour attention to the Commonwealth SecondaryScholarship list for this year. Our boysgained 13, representing 25% of our candidates.I am certain that our successes in these fieldsare due largely to our well qualified andcapable staff, and also to our deliberatepolicy of small classes. Individual attentionis tlle keystone to our structure, and this willalways be superior to the massed intakes and11assembly-line tactics of other educationalorganisations.John Chambers gained a University EntranceScholarship; David Jackett was secondin the Sir Richard Dry Exhibition for MatriculationMathematics; Mark Upcher wonthe University Prize for topping the State inMatriculation Economics; and Michael Streetwith John Chambers were awarded ElectrolyiticZinc Cadetships to the University.At the University itself Richard Howroydwon the Victoria Stourton Prize for HistoryIIA; John Upcher won the Nany ParkeBeedham Memorial Law Prize and also theJames Backhouse Walker Prize given forgreatest proficiency in his course; John Blackwoodwon the Perpetual Trustees Prize forEquity, and also the Walker Third ExaminationPrize.The boys at school are doing well in manyaspects ranging from the Alliance Francaise,the Australia Day Essay and Art Competitionwhere the school won 4 out of the 5 majorawards, the Mathematical Association of Tasmaniacompetition where three major prizeswere won, and just recently two prizes whichwere awarded by the Tasmanian FieldNaturalists' Club. One of these went to DavidZiegeler for finding a rare highly colourfulrichea or grass tree as yet unnamed; and theother went to Philip Young, as the annualprize in the State for the best natural historyresearch and observation, for his outstandingresearch into aboriginal camp sites in theMidlands. It is particularly gratifying to seethat rewarding hobbies such as these arebeing pursued by our boys. I hope that bythis time next year we shall be able to arrangethe display of work such as this in our newlibrary, and that other boys will be encouragedto delve into the exciting unknown.What of the exciting unknown ahead ofus in the School? We shall continue investigationsinto many aspects. One of the mostimportant will be the introduction of Malayinto the Junior School. We were lucky tobe able to appoint a trained teacher fromMalaya, Miss Oh. She will largely use thedirect method of approach and I am certainthat youngsters wiII readily assimilate thelanguage. More important still will be thebackground knowledge they will learn of ourneighbouring countries. In the Senior School